


Fire and gasoline

by chick_with_wifi



Series: #root [3]
Category: Person of Interest (TV)
Genre: Angst, Character Study, F/F, POV First Person, POV Root (Person of Interest)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-12
Updated: 2016-09-12
Packaged: 2018-08-14 17:17:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 625
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8022415
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chick_with_wifi/pseuds/chick_with_wifi
Summary: "I think there's a flaw in my code, the voices won't leave me alone."





	Fire and gasoline

**Author's Note:**

> Massive thanks to Thought (www.thought-.tumblr.com) for the advice about Root's implant.

Laid in bed in the subway station, sometimes I allow myself to imagine a day when I rescue Sameen from the evil clutches of Samaritan. Marching into wherever their headquarters are with a curtain of smoke behind me, guns blazing, shooting down Greer and Lambert at the instructions of the Machine in my ear, taking Sameen by the hand and pulling her to safety. Woe betide anyone who gets in our way or tries to seperate us again after that. Four alarm fire in an oil refinery indeed. 

Not that my Sam would ever allow herself to be rescued like a damsel in distress. If anything, the minute she heard me coming she would take down the bad guys herself and meet me on the front step with a little smirk, “What took you so long?”

I sigh and roll over, burrowing deeper under the covers. The Machine is back up and running, it felt good to get back to work and investigate some numbers. Kinda took my mind off the soul-crushing emptiness of being in the subway without Shaw. Plus now that I have Her in my ear again there is less chance of me feeling hollow and alone. Her voice is a constant, comforting presence hovering just on the edge of my mind.

“Are you there?” I ask quietly.

_“Yes._ The instentanious reply reassures me and chases away the dark thoughts like a vicious wild animal fiercely protecting her own. The analogy almost makes me laugh. _“Did you want something?”_

“No,” I say lightly. “Just wanted to hear Your voice. I missed you.”

She doesn't reply again so I get my music player from beside my bed and put an earbud in my good ear. I tried using large headphones over the sound processor of my implant but everything sounded tinny and distorted on that side which was not my idea of fun. Long story short: never again. 

I scroll through my song list and eventually choose one I have loved ever since I first heard it. Gasoline by Halsey. The familiar chords pierce the silence and I close my eyes.

‘Are you insane like me? Been in pain like me?’

Somehow these lyrics feel like they are speaking directly to me. Insane? Well, I don't know about that but people seem awfully fond of using that word and its synonyms to describe me.

‘Do you tear yourself apart to entertain like me?  
Do the people whisper 'bout you on the train like me?  
Saying that you shouldn't waste your pretty face like me?’

Again, I heard things like that back in Texas. And for a few years afterwards.

The notes waver back and forth then the beat takes off.

‘And all the people say,

"You can't wake up, this is not a dream,  
You're part of a machine, you are not a human being,  
With your face all made up, living on a screen,  
Low on self esteem, so you run on gasoline."’

Perhaps the first time I felt like maybe there was somebdoy else like me in the world was when I heard these lyrics. Part of a machine. Not a human being. Things I longed to be and occasionally pretended I was when carrying out a particularly...arduous task. 

‘I think there's a flaw in my code,  
These voices won't leave me alone’

I smile to myself a little. The voice in _my_ head is not one I would want to leave me alone. But for so long I believed human beings, myself included, were just bad code. Then there was an unexpected contingency in the from of Sameen Shaw and the Machine. I don't know if I still think we’re bad code, but that’s certainly not all we are.


End file.
